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A Celestial Doctrine: James Turrell, Art, and Technology in Cold War Los Angeles
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 March 2022
Abstract
This article examines sculptor James Turrell's late 1960s Art & Technology residency at Garrett Corporation, an aerospace and defense subcontractor based in Los Angeles. It considers Turrell's early life, his participation in the residency through the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and his and collaborators’ subsequent production, to show that artists could interact with the Cold War military–industrial complex in ways that surpassed mere protest or complicity. Despite his political beliefs, Turrell's participation in the project embedded his sculptural practice in the Cold War political economy of the American state in ways that should expand scholarly definition and study of what constitutes foreign-policy practice and doctrine.
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- Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press in association with the British Association for American Studies
References
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96 Ibid., 76, 79. Thomas also outlines other artistic strategies and philosophies that influenced Turrell's practice.
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100 Ibid.
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102 “About,” Roden Crater, at http://rodencrater.com/about.
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